Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1887-04-16
AssAILING THE sCHooL-BooK SYSTEM.

Our local columns yesterday gave pub
licity to the fact that systematic scheme
is on foot to destroy public confidence in
the ability Of the State to prepare school
books that will serve the purposes for
which they are intended The people
were prepared for assaults by interested
parties upon the text of the books and the
wisdom of the scheme that freed the State
from the tyranny and chicane of the school
book publishers; but it was not expected
that the enmity to the States system
would proceed to attempts to show that the
books have not been properly printed and
bound 1t has been demonstrated that the
State can produce good textbooks at a
saving to the people of more than half of
the sum they have heretofore been assessed
for these necessaries. Whoever candidly
and without prejudice examines the books
having fair knowledge of the merits of
well-printed and well-bound volume
must confess that those sent out from the
Se"tS UNIV aIc VI tle HrSt Oruer. Leu
here is the undeniable evidence that some
rascally scheme is on foot to give the pub
lie the impression that the work is i'll
done, and that State workmen cannot COM
pete with those In private employment.
Thus, contemporaneous with senseless
growl about the paper and the Typography,
books are returned to the Superintendent
of Printing, with the back binding broken
and the threads torn through the paper,
with the statement that the volumes
would not bear opening and ordinary
handling. The truth is, as anyone can
demonstrate, that no school book printed
on paper can be so bound that it will not
"break up" if opened in a particular
manner. Let anyone who doubts it, take
any close-bound book, partly open it, grip
with the thumbs and fingers the pages
and covers so tightly that they cannot
slip by each other, and then open the
book quickly. 1t will be found that
the threads, or other devices
securing the pages, will pull through the
paper Under such q test something must
give way. So, too, if book is seized
firmly by lower corner and the opposite
lower corner is beaten upon hard surface,
it will be found that the volume will be
fearfully racked, no matter how firmly
bound. Both these processes appear to
have been employed upon some of the
the State school books sent out, and the
results cited as evidence that the work has
not been well done. They are devices of
those who are determined to break down
the State school-book system. 1t saves
too much money to the people; it shears
too closely the publishers and agents who
have fattened upon the parents of the
country by the sale of school books at
enormous profits; it breaks up the gangs of
political heelers which have operated SO
long upon Boards of Education in the in
terest of book houses it frees the teachers
to great extent from the tyranny of the
school-book makers, and, above all, it con-
serves the economy of the purses of the
taxpayers. The book plotters had as well
abandon their schemes the system will
not be destroyed; it is not to be broken
down; State that has once smoked out
the textbook rats will not again permit its
educational system to be infested with